東方実在相 ～ Dream Logical World/设定与剧情/Afterword

后言

It feels like a dream, but after six years of development, three alone and three with the rest of Analogue Reverie, Dream Logical World is finished.	真像一场梦啊。经历了六年的开发——三年的独自开发与三年的和Analogue Reverie的朋友们一起的开发——实在相终于完成了。
I was aware from the start that this isn't a game that would necessarily appeal to all Touhou players. I and my team made a lot of experimental choices with the gameplay, aesthetics, and story. But my goal was to just create the game I wanted to create, and try to make it the best possible experience for whatever audience might enjoy it. The story came first, and I came up with the Aspect Shift system to fit the story. In terms of danmaku design, the gimmicky patterns in Marine Benefit really appealed to me, and that was probably the biggest singular source of inspiration.
Of course, there were some major course corrections from my friends in AR. Working with a system not quite like any other Touhou game certainly had its challenges, and there was lots of back-and-forth over calibrating the Aspect Shift system, how to make sure players wouldn't be confused by some of the more unconventional spell cards, and just about every other aspect of the game. Revisions only became more frequent as we approached completion—there wasn't even a fifth difficulty until less than a year before the full release (we made a new Easy mode, easier than the previous Easy, and moved the other four difficulties up one level).
I was also aware from the start that this is an incredibly huge game by Touhou standards. As per the classic mistake of first-time game developers, though, what I didn't anticipate is how long it would take. Do I regret making DLW this big? Well, it's already over. No point in ruminating about it now. If I had known how long I'd have to work on it, I might have cut the Principle and Language teams? I'm not sure I can see myself cutting more than that, though. There was never any plan for stage 4 other than boss fights with the other playable teams. The theme and story of DLW just made it, in my eyes, the perfect game for it. I thought giving every team an "aspect of existence" theme and basing their fight around that could result in some unique patterns.
The story wasn't inspired by any particular mythology, but rather personal experiences in the lives of myself and some friends. As you may have figured out, DLW is set chronologically between Impossible Spell Card and Urban Legend in Limbo (in November 2014, to be exact, assuming the games are set roughly around the time of their release), which goes to show what games were most recent when I came up with the idea. Not everyone will be interested in the story, but for me, it can greatly enhance the experience of a game, so it's there for those who feel the same. Incidentally, with so many Touhou fangames out by now, multiple games from the same developers sometimes reference each other and form a shared canon. Kaisendo is currently the biggest one, and Dream Compass is building one as well. Fangames from different developers occasionally reference each other as well, resulting in a myriad of different overlapping canons. The Dream Compass canon includes the Kaisendo canon, but not necessarily the other way around. Glory of Deep Skies also references the Kaisendo canon but not the Dream Compass one.
It's pretty much impossible for all fangames to exist in the same universe because eventually we run into contradictions and multiple interpretations of the same source material. As far as development for this game was concerned, I assumed that no other fangames are canon. If you want to build a personal headcanon that includes both DLW and one or more other fangames, though, I certainly won't stop you. (P.S. Hey Dream Compass, I'm still waiting to find out why Sayuri wanted Soujouko to destroy Gensokyo.)
I'll be treating myself to a break after DLW is released, but you'll eventually be seeing more projects from Analogue Reverie. I may or may not be leading them, and they may or may not be anything like DLW, but we'll be doing more stuff. I hope you'll watch warmly.
VYCM (VY Canis Majoris is a red supergiant or hypergiant star and one of the largest stars currently known to astronomy. It's approximately 1,400 times wider and 270,000 times more luminous than our Sun, and if it replaced the Sun its surface would extend out to between the orbits of Jupiter and Saturn. It's nearing the end of its life and will explode as a supernova fairly soon in astronomical terms, but in objective age it's much younger than most stars because the more massive a star is, the faster it goes through its life cycle. You can find VY CMa at RA 7h 22m 58s, dec -25° 46' 3".) ~★~